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Nestle

Anyone who follows this blog read about my trials with Lettie, my departed dog. She contracted Chronic Renal Failure and died about two years back. All that we went through is documented with that tag if you care to search for it from www.ramblingmoose.com .

She always, and I do mean always, ate Purina products until she got sick. Then it was too late. I went through about two years of syringe feeding her until it got to be too much for her and we had to put her to sleep.

After she was gone, we started hearing about Purina and their practice of sourcing ingredients from China in order to prepare their so-called foods. An overview of the 2007 recalls of petfoods is on Wikipedia, but frankly, a recall of petfoods like the Beneful that I fed Lettie won’t bring the pet back. Once the kidneys are damaged beyond a certain point, function will not be restored.

After going through all of that, I simply decided for myself. No Purina for my dog, No Nestle for me.

Simply put it’s safer. A company that is producing something that is fed to a dog is making a decision for a creature who can not decide for themselves. You can and should decide for them.

When we got Rack, my McNab dog two years back, we vowed never to feed him anything that we could not trust. That evolved into no US Made dog foods at this point because of the stories of tainted treats and foods that we kept hearing.

The Federal and State food inspection regimens have been diluted by defunding of the protective agencies. All inspection that is done by a percentage sampling basis. That percentage as a result gets lower because of fewer inspectors. Logically, it would mean that there is a greater chance that tainted food gets through the sampling procedure as a result.

The brand we were recommended to try, Orijen, is made in Canada. Apparently the laws there are much more strict than the laws we have here. It’s produced with “Human Grade” food, I once read.

Unfortunately, they’re so well liked, that Orijen is going to open a plant here in the US, in Kentucky, to meet demand.

So lets see, I’ve been paying a premium for dog food produced in Canada that will now be made in one of the most poorly enforced states for food production, In My Opinion, in the United States.

When Orijen begins producing the food in the US I will cease purchasing their products. I don’t know where I will go, but I have absolutely no confidence in the ability of inspectors in Kentucky at this time.

Again, My Opinion. Yours may vary. I may be overly critical, but I also was the person who had to prepare a slurry of food to syringe down my dog’s throat twice a day to keep her alive.

The difference is that the US allows a markedly lower quality of component foods to go into dog foods. Markedly lower quality meaning sourced from overseas at times. Yes, you guessed it, China. China doesn’t effectively police their own foods. Things get sold simply because you are willing to buy them, and there is no active warranty for anyone to pursue. Just look at the mess that the online electronics markets have become and how easy it is to find on the larger international websites items that have been shipped here directly from China or shipped through other countries to mask their origin.

While a trinket will most likely break and be discarded like so many glow sticks on the street after the latest holidays, a dog, or other pet, is something that a person builds a relationship with like a family member.

Would you feed a child food that may or may not kill them? I certainly wouldn’t with my dog and I won’t take a chance with a tainted supply.

So Nestle is off my menu, as is Purina for my dog. I only wish I knew beforehand since my own Lettie could still be alive today.

Now there is a class-action lawsuit against Purina for these tainted foods. That won’t bring Lettie back. It won’t make the Chairman of the Board lose any sleep. It will be a slap on the wrist, and they’ll just go on draining the water tables since they don’t believe that access to water is a fundamental human right, and continue importing Chinese components that may or may not be tainted with Melamine to go into their pet foods.

No matter what, I won’t be back.

Again, it’s only my opinion. You decide for yourself. But I won’t buy Nestle or Purina products.